Cram Session: University now offering Scholarships to League of Legends players

If you’re on the lookout for a university to attend and happen to play League of Legends you may want to consider applying for Robert Morris University in Illinois. The University just announced it would begin a new athletic program dedicated to competing in League of Legends Collegiate Starleague. Starting in the fall, RMU will compete against 103 other schools of higher learning, but what makes RMU’s addition to the roster unique is the fact that the University is the first to offer significant scholarship backing to qualified students. Suddenly playing League in your dorm is the equivalent of “working out”.

According to the official press release issued by RMU,”qualified gamers can earn scholarships of up to 50% tuition and 50% room and board” a figure that amounts to $19,000 per person. In order to qualify students should have experience in the High School Starleague or other similar League tournaments.

As for why RMU decided to support League so heavily, RMU’s Associate Athletic Director Kurt Melcher shed some light on the matter by explaining:

Robert Morris University has always been at the forefront of providing opportunities for a diverse student population with different interests and skills. League of Legends is a competitive, challenging game which requires significant amount of teamwork to be successful.

Those who achieve varsity status in the program will go on to compete for a spot in the North American Collegiate Championship where they can win an additional $100,000 in scholarship money, at which point they’d probably just drop out and play League professionally.

Seriously though, if you’re good enough to win the Collegiate Championship, chances are you at least have a shot at a professional team and professional teams don’t start after college, they begin in college when reaction times are at their peaks. So the question becomes do you have what it takes to give up college and make it in the big leagues or do you stay in college and remain a school athlete?

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14 Readers Commented

It is Fascinating how the US is supporting Games and the Gamer while in Germany you are treated like a Addicted Psychopath and all that on a Political and Mass Media level. One of the Reasons i hate this country so much.

So many University’s and what not already proofed that games are good for certain things a like Tactical thinking, think ahead and think about the Consequences, reaction speed and and and, but still German Politics and the Media treat you as a Psychopath, if they could they would ban EVERY damn game from the Market.

It shows how rotten this Country is, a country were underage getting wasted each weekend and are treated like heroes of the Youth while gamer are treated like Anti Social, fat, unclean and and and, society treats us like Outcasts, people without any future, people with a life worth less than shit.

Well I wouldn’t go to far in thinking things are peachy here in the US. While we are tolerated here in the US and things are steadily beginning to change. We’re still one of the first things blamed when some nut job goes crazy and goes shooting something up.

Only reason gaming is more accepted in the us now is due to studies by scientist proving that gaming and media aren’t directly responsible for violence, people who have violent tendencies just happen to be drawn in easily by gore. It’s not globally accepted yet. Even in the US there are still ignorant people who manage to land jobs as attorneys or in media and attempt to use gaming as a scape goat, people are just more aware that it’s bullshit now.

Reaction time does NOT peak in college (early 20s). It peaks in the late 20s. You start to decline in the 30s, but the rate isn’t noticeable until you hit 50, when it falls off completely.

So strictly speaking, all of the pro gamers right now are no where near their peak. But no one sticks around that long for an e-sport, so we’ll probably never see the top form of guys like WeiXiao or Uzi.

Yeah, I’ve read that one before. That’s just one research though. There has been a wide range of research over the years in this field and the general consensus is about late 20s. Check out Kosinski’s work at Clemson University.

If I could play MOBAs or LoL good enough to get a scholarship to college I totally would do it(or would of). Crap ain’t cheap and if you can get money for it that way, totally do it and actually stay in school.